Things You'll Need:
- Leg of pork
- 10 to 12 pounds of cooking (pickling or Kosher) salt
- Cracked pepper
- Coriander
- White vinegar or white wine vinegar
- Wooden box or wine case large enough to hold the meat
- Wooden board
- Muslin
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Step 1
Bone the leg or have your butcher "tunnel-bone" it, a process that removes the bone without cutting the meat of the leg. To bone yourself, slice into the "short" side (the back---where the meat is thick), then scrape around the bone with a boning knife or very sharp small knife, exposing the entire bone along the leg until you can lift it out.
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Step 2
Rub a handful of salt into the inside of the leg or through the tunnel. If you have boned the leg yourself, use butcher's string to close up the leg; poke holes with a kabob skewer along the cut on either side and close up the leg with a blanket stitch (one side of a shoe lace), using a darning needle or small turkey pin.
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Step 3
Put an inch-deep bed of salt in the wooden box and sprinkle it with pepper and coriander. Lay the leg in the box, outside (meatiest) down and cover the leg with salt until the salt is at least an inch deep all over the leg.
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Step 4
Place a piece of wood flat on top of the salted leg. The wood should fit tightly inside the walls of the box (to cover all of the leg). Weigh it down with a stone or other weight that weighs about twice as much as the meat.
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Step 5
Store the box in a cool, dry place like a cellar for a day and a half to two per pound (a 10-pound leg would take 15 to 20 days to cure). At the end of the curing period, wash the ham with vinegar, wrap in two layers of muslin and hang in a cool, well-ventilated place to dry for four to six months.
